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Cersei Lannister
Queen Cersei I Lannister is the widow of King Robert Baratheon and Queen of the Seven Kingdoms. She is the daughter of Lord Tywin Lannister, twin sister of Jaime Lannister and elder sister of Tyrion Lannister. She has an incestuous relationship with Jaime, who is secretly the father of her three children, Joffrey, Myrcella and Tommen. After the assassinations of Joffrey and Myrcella and Tommen's suicide in the wake of the destruction of the Great Sept of Baelor, Cersei assumed the throne under the name of Cersei of the House Lannister, the First of Her Name, Queen of the Andals and the First Men, Protector of the Seven Kingdoms. Biography Cersei Lannister Background|Backround Cersei Lannister Season 1|Season 1 Cersei Lannister Season 2|Season 2 Cersei Lannister Season 3|Season 3 Cersei Lannister Season 4|Season 4 Cersei Lannister Season 5|Season 5 Cersei Lannister Season 6|Season 6 Cersei Lannister Season 7|Season 7 Appearances TV series Video game Image Gallery Got cersei poster.jpg|Cersei featured in a promotional poster for Game of Thrones. Jaime and Cersei 1x01.jpg|Jaime and Cersei worrying about what Jon Arryn knew in "Winter is Coming". Cersei 1x01.jpg|Cersei arriving at Winterfell in "Winter is Coming". Cersei 1x02.jpg|Cersei breakfasting in Winterfell in "The Kingsroad". Cersei 1x03.jpg|Cersei in her bed chamber in King's Landing in "Lord Snow". Jaime & Cersei 1x03.png|Cersei with Jaime in "Lord Snow". Cersei 1x07.jpg|Cersei in the gardens of the Red Keep in "You Win or You Die". Cersei & Joffrey 1x07.jpg|Cersei ensures Joffrey takes the Iron Throne in "You Win or You Die". Cersei 2x01a.jpg|Cersei in the Iron Throne room in "The North Remembers". Cersei 2x01b.jpg|Cersei talking to Littlefinger in "The North Remembers". Cersei Little Finger Season2.jpg|Cersei walking with Littlefinger in "The North Remembers". Cersei-lannister-lena-headey-helen-sloan.jpeg|A promotional image of Cersei in "The North Remembers". Cersei 2x02.jpg|Cersei in the Small Council chamber in "The Night Lands". Cersei_S2Promo.jpg|Cersei in "The Night Lands". Cersei and Tyrion 2x06.jpg|Cersei and Tyrion watching the departure of Myrcella in "The Old Gods and the New". Cersei 2x09.jpg|Cersei in "Blackwater". CerseiEW.png|Entertainment Weekly (EW) photo of Lena Headey in costume as Cersei Lannister. Game of thrones cast.jpg|Magazine photo shoot of the Game of Thrones cast. Cersei Season 3.jpg|Cersei in Season 3. Cersei_Lannister_S3_got.jpg|Season 3 still. Got_Cersei_promo_season_3.jpg|TV Guide photo shoot, Cersei Season 3. Tyrion and Sansa wedding 3x08.jpg|Tyrion and Sansa with Tywin, Cersei, Joffrey, Lord Varys, Grand Maester Pycelle, Margaery, Lady Olenna, and Loras in "Second Sons". Tv-guide-game-of-thrones-cersei.jpg|TV Guide photoshoot of Cersei in Season 3. Tywin Joff and Cersei Mhysa.png|Tywin, Joffrey, and Cersei in "Mhysa". Joff and Cersei Varys Mhysa.png|Cersei, Joffrey, and Varys in "Mhysa". Season4-GOT-CERSEIposter.jpg|Cersei in Season 4 promotional image. 110312-Cersei-Lannister-season-4-meme-0e4U.jpeg game-of-thrones-season-4-vengeance-trailer-cersei-lannister.jpg IFI Pre-Release 3.png|Cersei as she appears in the video game. Cersei Lannister (S05E01).jpg|Cersei inside the Great Sept of Baelor in "The Wars to Come". Cersei_Lannister_(S05E10).jpg|Cersei before her Walk of Atonement in Season 5. Game_of_Thrones_Season_6_22.jpg|Cersei in Season 6 GOT S6 03.png|Jaime and Cersei in Season 6 GOT S6 04.png|Season 6 The_Winds_of_Winter_15.jpg|Cersei in "The Winds of Winter." Queen_Cersei_Main_The_winds_of_Winter.jpg|Cersei wearing her crown in "The Winds of Winter". Family tree Quotes ;Spoken by Cersei ;Spoken to/about Cersei Behind the Scenes Actress Lena Headey became pregnant just before Season 1 began filming. However, the production team was so enthusiastic about her performance, and the larger scale concern of having Headey play Cersei for several years, that they didn't recast the role but instead worked around her pregnancy by, for example, keeping the camera frame above her waist or having her sit at a table. For wide shots when Cersei is walking around, notice that most of Cersei's costumes in Season 1 have large billowing sleeves which she carries in front of her to hide her pregnancy. At other times, body doubles were shot from behind in quick-cuts. This may also explain why Cersei's sex scene with Jaime isn't as involved as it is in the books, in which they are both completely naked and have an extended conversation intermixed with lovemaking. In the TV series, Cersei and Jaime are mostly clothed, with Jaime simply pulling her dress up, and Jaime is taking her from behind, so the viewer can't see that the actress is pregnant. The TV producers actually made it a point never to show Cersei naked since the beginning of the TV series, even during sex scenes, specifically to make it more shocking when her penance walk would occur years later (ultimately in Season 5's "Mother's Mercy").http://www.themarysue.com/lena-headey-strong-female-characters-cersei/ Just before Season 4 aired, Lena Headey spoke about the upcoming scene in such a way that it vaguely seemed like she was considering performing it herself, but ultimately a body double was used (model Rebecca Van Cleave), and Lena's head was then digitally added onto her body. Why Headey ultimately used a body double is unclear: one possible but unconfirmed explanation is that in February 2015 (after filming had ended), Headey revealed that she was pregnant with her second child - but she was so upset about how the media had been invasive about the divorce of her first marriage that she would not reveal who the father was, or any other details about her personal life. Therefore it is unknown when she first became pregnant and if this could have interfered with any nude scenes. Headey later revealed that the real reason she didn't do the nude scene herself is simply because she felt she wouldn't be able to stay in-character: Cersei is supposed to make the entire penance walk with an utterly stoic face, but Headey felt she could not restrain herself from emoting (as extras also fling filth and insults at her) - not that she felt she would start crying, but rather, that she felt she couldn't restrain herself from reacting angrily, glaring at the crowd, when it is explicitly important that the character doesn't react. Her second pregnancy actually had nothing to do with the decision because that happened later. In the books In the A Song of Ice and Fire novels, Cersei is a beautiful but also somewhat cold woman who does not get along with her husband, whom she considers to be a fat oaf. However, she dotes on and loves her three children. She is not politically skilled, and frustrated that her options for power are limited by her gender. Cersei is close to her brother Jaime, but is cowed by her father and despises Tyrion, whom she blames for killing her mother Joanna, who died giving birth to him. Cersei and Jaime were around 10 years old when Tyrion was born and Joanna died. In the series, it is mentioned that Cersei was 4 instead, a change which better reflects the relative ages of the actors (Peter Dinklage is four years older than Lena Headey). According to the novels, Cersei never gave birth to any child by Robert. As she revealed to Eddard Stark, she was only pregnant by Robert once and aborted the child out of hatred for its father. Robert was unaware of both the pregnancy and the abortion. In the TV series, she revealed to Catelyn Stark that she'd had a "beautiful, black-haired boy", but he'd died of a fever. Tywin does plan to find a new husband for Cersei, though not Loras Tyrell, who has been made a Kingsguard after the Battle of the Blackwater. Willas Tyrell, Mace's eldest son and heir who is not in the TV series, is Tywin's first choice. However, Olenna Tyrell vetoes the match in revenge for the Lannisters foiling her plot to marry Sansa Stark to Willas. Prince Oberyn Martell is also suggested as a match. Cersei never threatens her father with revealing Tommen's true parentage if she is forced to re-marry. Cersei becomes a POV narrator in the fourth novel. With her father dead, she once more rules the Seven Kingdoms as Queen Regent. She grows increasingly paranoid and vindictive, drinks heavily and endlessly schemes to deal with her enemies, real and imagined (Margaery, Jon Snow, Bronn, Trystane Martell, etc.). All of Cersei's schemes, with no exception, somehow go wrong - foiled, backfire or never come to fruition; even those that initially succeed - turn to be too costly. During her reign, Cersei becomes alcoholic and takes lovers of both genders, among them Osney Kettleblack and Lady Taena Merryweather. Jaime, who has been growing more and more distant from Cersei, is disgusted by her behavior; he finds it ironic that she has adopted the same negative habits she hated so much about Robert. Cersei's paranoia increases so much that she interprets every statement, causal comment or even a smile as a plot against her. For instance: Kevan advises her to appoint either Randyll Tarly or Mathis Rowan as Tommen's Hand; since both are the Tyrells' bannermen, Cersei hastily concludes that her uncle is a traitor, bought by the Tyrells to act against her - which is a totally wrong conclusion. Cersei is annoyed at the Tyrells due to their nonstop demands, among them to wed Margaery to Tommen so soon after Joffrey's death. As time passes, Cersei's annoyance gradually turns into mistrust, and then to paranoia: she becomes convinced that the Tyrells, Margaery in particular, are plotting against her, have conspired with Tyrion to kill Joffrey and maybe her father too (she does not suspect Littlefinger at all). Her suspicions are fuelled when a gold Highgarden coin is found in the cell of a jailer named Rugen (in fact, Varys in disguise), who disappeared the night Tyrion escaped; that makes her suspect the Tyrells - not Jaime - helped Tyrion escape by bribing the guards, and confirms her former suspicions about them. She has nightmares about Tyrion and thinks he is still hiding in the walls of the Red Keep, planning to kill her and her children. Until now, her obsessive hatred for Tyrion has effectively blinded her to the presence of her true enemies, believing that anything and everything that happens to her family was somehow Tyrion's doing (including the attempt of Gerold "Darkstar" Dayne to kill Myrcella – the end result of a plot insitaged by a rouge member of House Martell who was actually trying help Myrcella), and this obsession only grows after Tyrion kills Tywin. Cersei soon makes a number of rash and ill-judged decisions. She fills the Small Council with her own cronies, picked for their loyalty to her rather than their competence, disregarding Tywin's previous arrangements. Despite the Crown's heavy debts, she orders the construction of a new royal fleet and puts it under the command of Aurane Waters, a bastard sellsail of questionable loyalty, who later steals the entire fleet. She refuses to honor the Crown's debt to the Iron Bank of Braavos. In retaliation the Iron Bank begins calling in loans all over Westeros, causing economic chaos, and eventually sends a representative to Stannis Baratheon to offer to finance him. In return for cancelling the Crown's debts to the Faith, she allows the Faith Militant to be re-established, oblivious to the strife they had caused the Targaryens centuries earlier. Pycelle, who previously was Cersei's henchman, keeps arguing and objecting to her poor decisions, but his protests fall on deaf ears. She offers her uncle Kevan the position of Hand of the King, but he insists on being named Regent and, in accordance with Tywin's plans, that Cersei return to Casterly Rock and re-marry. He also calls her an unfit mother, and hints that he knows Jaime fathered her children. In response she throws her wine in his face. Out of spite, Cersei then names two Lannister cousins Warden of the West and Castellan of Casterly Rock, respectively, instead of Kevan. She ignores the advice of Kevan and Jaime to appoint a capable and respected man like Randyll Tarly or Mathis Rowan as Hand, and chooses the weak and compliant Harys Swyft. Her paranoia also leads to her plotting to have Jon Snow killed, fearing that as Ned Stark's (presumed) last surviving son, he may rally the Night's Watch against the Lannisters. She also places a bounty on Tyrion, promising a lordship to whoever brings her his head, which leads to the deaths of many dwarfs and even ordinary children on both sides of the Narrow Sea. Her actions also alienate Jaime, who wants nothing to do with the increasing brutality and rampant cronyism of her reign and flatly tells his sister she is seeing enemies where none exist and turning what few allies she has left against her. Jaime is also haunted by Tyrion's revelation that Cersei has been cheating on him with Lancel Lannister and Osmund Kettleblack, amongst others, which Jaime eventually realizes is true. In the books, after Tywin dies Cersei becomes the new head of House Lannister, but she appoints lesser cousins to other titles Tywin held: Daven Lannister (son of Stafford Lannister) is made the new Warden of the West, and even more distant cousin Damion Lannister is named castellan of Casterly Rock (Cersei is Lady of the castle, but she isn't there to rule it directly). No mention was made in the corresponding Season 5 of the TV series about exactly who holds the titles that Tywin used to hold - possibly implying that Cersei is the new Wardeness, but this awaits clarification. Instead of having Loras Tyrell arrested by the Faith on charges of homosexuality, Cersei sends him to capture Dragonstone, hoping he will die in the attempt due to his rashness; he is fatally injured but somehow clings to life by the point the books reached. Cersei also orders her lover Osney Kettleblack to seduce Margaery, in a scheme to bring about Margaery's downfall. When he fails to do so, Cersei compiles a long, dubious, list of individuals Margaery has supposedly slept with, including Kettleblack, who is then sent to the High Septon to confess. Margaery is arrested, but the plot backfires when the High Septon grows suspicious of Kettleblack's confession and has him tortured. Kettleblack then admits the truth: that he never touched Margaery but he has been sleeping with Cersei, and that he killed the previous High Septon on her orders. Cersei's stupidity is underscored by the fact that even the unworthy people she has recently appointed to the Small Council - who mainly act as "yes men" - are aware of the dangerous applications of Margaery's arrest. They express their concern that, due to Margaery's popularity and her family's military strength, the smallfolk will riot and Mace will storm King's Landing. Cersei, smug about her "victory", is not worried, but agrees that some precautions must be taken. Of course, she could have figured the consequences of her ill-conceived scheme (and the rest of her schemes) in advance, had she thought it over. Cersei is arrested by the High Sparrow on charges of high treason, fornication, incest, regicide, deicide and adultery. She confesses only the lesser charges - sleeping with Lancel and others, claiming she did that only after Robert's death (namely that she is guilty of fornication, but not of adultery); she denies all the other charges and demands a trial by combat, though she soon realizes that her choices for a champion are limited, since as the acting Queen, her champion must be a Kingsguard. She writes to Jaime, pleading for help, but he ignores her letter, since he believes she is guilty of all the crimes she is charged with. She is allowed to return to the Red Keep by walking naked through the streets of King's Landing, while she is jeered by the crowd. Once she arrives, she is met by Qyburn, who introduces her to Ser Robert Strong (a re-animated Gregor Clegane), the newest member of the Kingsguard who will serve as her champion. Following the walk of atonement - in sharp contrast to the show - Cersei is stripped of all powers and authorities, including her seat at the Small Council; all her henchmen are either deposed, imprisoned or flee away; she is confined to her rooms rather than the Red Keep at large; all her guards are replaced by Kevan's men; her former ladies-in-waiting are replaced by a septa and three novices who watch her all the time, selected by the High Septon, and as an additional precaution - the novices are to be replaced every week, lest Cersei corrupts them; she cannot receive any visitors, including Tommen, without Kevan's permission; whatever schemes she has in mind, she cannot realize them. Qyburn is the only one who remains loyal to her. Kevan intends to return her to Casterly Rock after the trial (if she is not executed) and see that she remains there, unable to take part both in the governance of the realm and in Tommen's education, while he and the new appointed Small Council members take steps to repair the damages she caused. According to the TV series official pronunciation guide developed for the cast and crew, "Cersei Lannister" is pronounced "SER-see LAN-iss-ter". See also * (MAJOR spoilers from the books) References de:Cersei Lennister es:Cersei Lannister fr:Cersei Lannister it:Cersei Lannister lt:Cersei Lannister pl:Cersei Lannister pt-br:Cersei Lannister ru:Серсея Ланнистер zh:瑟曦·兰尼斯特 ro:Cersei Lannister Category:Queens Category:Members of House Lannister Category:Members of House Baratheon Category:Living individuals Category:Westermen Category:Kings of the Andals, the Rhoynar, and the First Men